MRS. TROLLOPE ' S LAURRINGTONS.
THE Laurringtons are a race of rural grandees, of the higher order of squirearchy ; claiming to rank among the magnates of the county on the strength of a long Welsh pedigree, and the possession of a moderate share of wealth derived from an alliance with the despised heiress of a rich pinmaker ; but resting their inordinate pretensions to be regarded as " superior people" on a combination of large bone, pure blood, and high breeding, such as race-horses are valued for,—though prize cattle of the bovine species would be a more apposite comparison. The Laurrington group is composed of a meek, ruminant mamma, who is permitted to chew the cud of contemplation in peace, and only occasionally utters a gentle low of remonstrance at the tyranny of her huge progeny ; her son and heir, a steer of enormous size and full growth, sleek with pamper- ing; and three ox-eyed heifers, also doing justice by their fine con- dition to the fat pasturage of Laurrington Lodge. The awful dig- nity of this bucolic family finds a fit representative in Mr. William Laurrington, its acknowledged head ; and the complacency with which the sisters and their bull-calf brother reciprocate the adulation which swells out their mutual aggrandizement, is amus- ing for a time ; but it soon grows wearisome. The whole set is dull and disagreeable ; nor, when the hulking leader of the herd in process of time has his curled forehead decorated with horns, does he afford much sport ; and the rampant love-making of his desperate sisters is too outrageously absurd to provoke laughter. Mrs. Watts, the rich old maiden aunt, and her pro- tégé Cecilia, are a relief to the vulgar airs and selfishness of the Laurringtons proper : but the benevolent old lady at last be- comes as inveterate a match-maker as the rest of the dowagers ; and the artless Cecilia is not altogether free from the charge of flirtation. The most finished sketches are Mr. and Miss Master- mann, a pair of aristocratic fortune-hunters. The lady succeeds in enmeshing her victim, Mr. William Laurrington; but her bro- ther loses his rich and wayward cousin, Lady Wilbury, by over- acting his part. The Baron de Schonberg may be " a true Ger- man," as Mrs. TROLLOPE protests he is—certainly he is the most natural and agreeable man of the party ; yet his portrait is defi- cient in those traits of character that give to a resemblance the stamp of life and individuality. Courtships and dinners in country- houses, flirtations at fetes and the opera, and the intrigues of ma- nceuvering mothers and aunto, oonotituto the ctaplo of this fiction. The sharp and observant eye of a shrewd, experienced woman of the world, detects many nice points that escape less quick perceptions; while the tact of the practised authoress throws spirit into the narration of many commonplace incidents. Yet the general im- pression left is that of a mixture of faint truth with glaring caricature, the latter greatly preponderating.
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